(North Haven, CT) – Connecticut State Medical Society President Jeffrey Gordon, MD and CSMS EVP/CEO Matthew Katz have issued the following statement in response to today’s US District Court ruling:

The Connecticut State Medical Society strongly supports the ruling made by US District Judge John D. Bates against the proposed $37B merger between Aetna and Humana.

Since late 2015, CSMS has expressed serious concerns about the proposed Aetna-Humana and Anthem-Cigna “mega-mergers,” and the potential negative effects of those mergers on physicians, patients, and insurance markets.

CSMS has been working here in Connecticut with the Universal Healthcare Foundation of Connecticut, the Connecticut Citizen Action Group, and the Connecticut Attorney General’s office to ensure that market competition and patient access to care are protected. Similar CSMS efforts were undertaken at the national level, working with the American Medical Association, the US Department of Justice, and US Senator Richard Blumenthal.

In today’s ruling, Judge Bates wrote that “[T]he Court is unpersuaded that the efficiencies generated by the merger will be sufficient to mitigate the anticompetitive effects for consumers in the challenged markets.”

CSMS is confident that similar antitrust concerns exist with the proposed Anthem-Cigna merger, and anticipates that the Court will issue a comparable ruling. In both cases, these mergers would do more harm than good. Rather than the promised savings from economies of scale, it is highly likely that the costs of these mergers would be borne by consumers through increased premiums, deductibles, and out-of-pocket costs, and by physicians through reductions in payment. These scenarios would lead to reduced access to care in many markets, including some areas that are already dangerously low.